Like Wren Beaumont gives me a fever.
After winning that game against the Wild, we went into our four-day stretch game free. One of the many reasons I’m happy to be a hockey player and not in the NFL. Four teams play today, and as much as I’m committed to my team as the next guy, I simply can’t imagine spending all Christmas day getting ready for, and then playing, a game.
Especially not for the guys with kids.
A pang rings through my chest, like it always does when I think about the plan I’d laid out with Mandy. According to that plan, she would be pregnant right now with our first.
Instead, she’s holding hands with a pop star. It’s less about Mandy and more about the question of whether or not I’ll be able to catch up. Be able to find someone else who would possibly want to have a family with me.
“Luca?” Wren asks, as we pull into the driveway, which is already practically full. We park behind Cal and Sloane and slide out.
“Yeah, my cousin,” I say, trying to blink away the weird feeling in my brain. “She’ll be the one trying to get you to drink spiked eggnog.”
“Well, lucky for me,” Wren says, bending into the backseat to pick up her bag of gifts, “I don’t drinkanyeggnog, so I should be safe.”
As we walk up the sidewalk—which is dutifully free of snow, salted, and dry—I file that little piece of information away into the growing space in my mind that’s dedicated to Wren.
Doesn’t like eggnog.
“Wren!” Mom says, opening the door and throwing her arms around Wren, who blinks in surprise and struggles not to drop her bag of gifts.
Dad appears, relieving her of the bag and taking his turn at a hug. Then my parents hug me, Dad patting me on the back in the exact way he’s done since I got tall enough for him to do it.
“Merry Christmas, champ,” he says, pulling back and smiling up at me, adjusting his glasses.
The house is already steaming, filled with the scent of a million things cooking in the kitchen and getting hot from far too many bodies in the house.
“You didn’t bring that sensor again, did you?” Mom asks, giving me a suspicious look.
“I just wanted you to be aware of the air quality in here,” I say, eyes darting to the living room where it sounds like Sloane and Katie are talking. “Probably wouldn’t be good for Sloane—”
Mom rolls her eyes. “We got those air purifiers. And we have a few windows open. Though your sister isnothappy about that—she says it’s freezing.”
“It’s a million degrees in here,” I counter, pulling at the collar of my sweater, but she’s already moved on to Wren.
“Come in here with me, darling,” she says, to which Wren darts an unsure look at me and turns to trail after. Dad hands me the bag of gifts and motions for me to follow them while he heads back to the kitchen.
When I get into the living room, I find Katie and Sloane on the couch, their laughter dying out as Mom leads Wren to the Christmas tree.
“Here,” she says, picking up one of the long, slim rectangular boxes that Sloane and I have come to recognize as being clothes. “This is for you—sorry we couldn’t get it to you sooner!”
Wren opens the box, pausing when she finds a sweater that matches with the rest of us. Mom gave me mine a month ago at Thanksgiving, and I wonder how in the world she managed to get another for Wren on such short notice.
Then I see the place whereWrenis stitched in over the heart, and realize exactly why she already had a small sweater ready. This one was supposed to go to Mandy, and Mom must have quickly undone the embroidery, adding Wren’s name instead.
Mandy’s voice, strained, pops into my head as if she were standing right there, “I just don’t see why they expect me to want to wear the dumb sweater. Like I gave away all individuality when I married you?”
“It’s just a dumb tradition,” I’d said, basically pleading with her on Christmas Eve. “Can you just wear it for the picture? Then you can take it off.”
Now, Wren bites her lip, looking up at my mom, and I realize there aretearsin her eyes. Once again, she’s delivering the performance of a lifetime.
“Thank you,” she says, sounding genuinely choked up. When I glance at my sister, her eyes are wide, flitting between me and Wren, who’s already taking her other sweater off to reveal a snug white turtleneck underneath that makes my heart stutter.
“Thank yousomuch,” Wren says.
When I meet Sloane’s gaze again, she has a tissue out, and is dabbing under her eyes.
“Shit,” I hear her mutter to Katie, “I told myself I wasn’t going to cry today.”
